Deep Waters (41 page)

How all this would go down at Felicity Evren’s trial, İkmen really didn’t know. Judges were notoriously conservative when it came to strange or paranormal crimes like this. Felicity Evren could very well be sent to an asylum. How very ironic that would be. But then, İkmen thought, so could he if he went too esoteric on them!

When they arrived back at his apartment building İkmen said goodbye to his colleagues and then spent a few moments alone in the snow looking at his reflection in the window of the jewellers beneath his home. And though he knew he was neither young nor attractive, he liked what he saw. His life was written in his face and, for all its hardships, he liked his life. To not have a reflection would be a denial of all that. İkmen scowled and then laughed at the image this created in the window. He lit a cigarette and went inside.

A lot of people, including lawyers, consular officials and even one relative from England, came to visit Felicity Evren in the days that followed. Through thick snow and icy winds they came, anxious to provide comfort, encouragement and advice. But the woman herself just sat, silent since her interview with İkmen and, with the exception of occasional visits to the bucket in the corner of her cell, unmoving. And even when İkmen was finally called in to see whether he could rouse her from her torpor, she just carried on sitting, staring at the the walls that contained her. Whether, as some believed, she was play-acting or not, it was patently obvious that in this condition she was in no position to be brought before a judge. Dr Sezer was called in to spend some time with her. Hüseyin Sezer was, as Zelfa Halman told İkmen when he went to see her about Halil, an expert in the field of altered, especially catatonic, states.

‘It is known that when long-held fantasies or delusions are brought to an end for whatever reason, the subject’s mind can shut down,’ she said. ‘If Felicity did indeed experience negative autoscopy for many years, the combination of finally having to face the reality of her appearance, followed by her father’s death plus her subsequent experiences, could well have primed the trigger.’

‘I was actually making some progress with her,’ İkmen said, ‘but—’

‘But you arrested her, Çetin, and so, like it or not, you provided the catalyst that pressed the trigger. You and I both know that nothing is truly decided until a person comes to trial, but to many lay people arrest equals guilt, which equals imprisonment. A whole host of negative concepts enter a person’s mind when he or she is arrested – shame, guilt, imprisonment, ruin, death. And with somebody like Felicity whose world was already imploding . . .’

İkmen rose to his feet and stretched wearily. ‘Mind you, Dr Sezer did say that when he went in she moved. “Inappropriate sexual gestures” was how he termed it.’

Zelfa raised an eyebrow. ‘Really?’

‘Çöktin, who accompanied the doctor, said that she made a couple of attempts at pulling Sezer’s hand between her legs.’

‘Which means,’ Zelfa said with a shrug, ‘that she may be play-acting but what is more plausible to me is that her underlying principal motivation is now coming through. I see a lot of this with my chronics. Years spent trying to repress some overriding fixation out in the world suddenly slip away when they’re admitted to hospital. Although we place our patients in chemical straitjackets, we also accept far more from them when they are hospitalised. Mad people, Çetin,’ she smiled, ‘do stuff we would never countenance in the sane. But they’re mad and so we make allowances.’

‘You think Felicity may be some kind of nymphomaniac?’

Zelfa moved forward to help her visitor on with his coat. ‘I think that had she been pretty or even ordinarily nondescript we wouldn’t be seeing what we’re seeing today. All part of the tyranny of youth and beauty,’ she said bitterly. ‘I feel sorry for her. All that woman ever really needed was a boyfriend who appreciated her as opposed to her money.’

‘Which, given the sums involved,’ İkmen said, ‘makes you wonder why her father never put her forward for plastic surgery.’

‘Well, I know they can do a lot these days,’ the psychiatrist replied, ‘but from what I’ve observed of Felicity there appears to be actual malformation of the bone structure, which is difficult to address. I don’t know why she’s like that, but what I do know is that if you start moving bone about you can get into real difficulty. Look at Michael Jackson.’

İkmen pulled a disgusted face. ‘Indeed.’

They stood and looked at each other for a few moments. İkmen seemed reluctant to go.

‘So you think that provided my brother has some support . . .’ he began.

‘Your brother has no history of psychological turmoil, Çetin,’ Zelfa replied. ‘It will be a shock, of course, but he is physically fit, you say. I know Arto is very worried about this but my own feelings are that if the truth is presented to Halil within the security of a loving Turkish family, you may find that the darkness that surrounds your mother’s death is not as impenetrable as you thought. There are usually flashes of awareness even within the most intransigent cases of denial. I mean, if we accept that Felicity Evren has been suffering from negative autoscopy, even she had to have some notion of herself as she really was to behave as she did. Reflection or no reflection, she knew she was unappealing. Why else would she have turned to her own barely pubescent brother?’

‘Well . . .’

‘If you were to bring Halil along here to have me break the news about your mother, he would be insulted, wouldn’t he?’

‘I’d only be trying to protect him.’

‘Yes,’ she smiled, ‘just like he tried to protect you when your mother died.’

Recalling his own feelings of resentment regarding this, İkmen nodded. ‘Point taken,’ he said. ‘And anyway he is a man.’

‘If you do need any help, you know where I am,’ Zelfa said.

‘Yes,’ he smiled. She opened the door for him and he left. She did, İkmen thought as he walked away, look very well indeed for a woman in her forties who was pregnant with her first child. A little larger than usual, but . . . Not that either Zelfa or Mehmet had told him about their impending addition. All Mehmet had said was that they were. going to marry sooner rather than later – news that İkmen had not commented upon. Unbeknown to his friend, İkmen had been in this situation himself long ago when Fatma had not been quite so staid as she was now. That and of course the fact that he was without doubt the son of the witch Ayşe Bajraktar. This meant that sometimes he didn’t have to be told things in order to acquire knowledge. As he descended the stairs to the street, he smiled.

When he got back to his office, İkmen first went to see Commissioner Ardiç and then, alone, spent some time reviewing the forensic evidence they had so far. It wasn’t good. No prints on the knife that killed İlhan Evren – but an immense amount of material pertaining to the Evren children, the chauffeur and the associate known as Dimitri Asanov, the man who had discovered Evren’s body. Tracked down from paperwork in Evren’s office, the police had found Asanov at his home, washing his blood-spattered clothes. İkmen had interviewed him. A nice enough man – a pimp – he’d been over in Polonezköy when Evren died. And no one had seen anyone either go into or come out of the Evren house during the night of the murder. Reserved rich Bebek folk.

And so it was possible that Felicity Evren could go free. There were no witnesses, no conclusive forensic evidence, no confession. But as he turned to the forensic reports pertaining to Rifat Berisha’s car, İkmen allowed himself a little smile. İlhan had been very good, hadn’t he? There was nothing of him in there. Ali and Felicity, yes, but İlhan? Received forensic wisdom stated that this had to be impossible. But as İkmen, if not the more technically minded Suleyman, knew, nothing is ever either foolproof or impossible. No wonder the British police had never been able to connect Evren to any acts of violence. They must have been so pleased to see the back of him when he came to Turkey. Clever old man!

But to return to Felicity. Who else could have killed her father? Apart from her brother, there was no one, and there didn’t appear to be any forensic evidence that couldn’t be accounted for, and no forced entry. Just a dead man and a broken mirror. According to Ardiç Felicity was going to be transferred to hospital. Dr Sezer was emphatic on the point. No date could be set for her hearing, nothing. Because that was just what they were getting from her – nothing. Where was she now in her mind? What strange landscapes was she viewing through the curtain of drugs they were already administering to her? The British newspapers were saying that she should be sent home and in a way İkmen felt they were right. After all, what progress could be made while she was surrounded by foreigners who did not speak her language? When people became ill like this it was common for them to regress to their first language. Yusuf Cohen was known to experience times when he could only communicate in Ladino, the language he had learned as an infant at his mother’s knee. Grimly, İkmen considered the possibility of how such a breakdown would affect him. Would he suddenly start to speak the Albanian his mother had sung to him? Would the world of Lek Dukagjini suddenly make perfect sense?

In a way, he had to admit, it already did. If nothing else his experiences with the Albanians had taught him that change is only possible through understanding. The rules of the Kunan were very old and had been nurtured in spite of the repressive tactics employed by successive conquerers. They were something of their own, unique. First the Ottomans and then the communists had tried to ban the Kunan, suppress it or reason adherents out of it, but it continued to survive. Because, bloody though it was, it was theirs alone and they would continue to die for it, as his mother had.

Angeliki Vlora and her two sons were due to appear in court that Wednesday – on drugs charges. Mehmet would then appear later charged with the murder of Egrem Berisha. The ‘boys’ had already given statements that absolved their mother from actually dealing. They took full responsibility for that. Angeliki would go to prison, but not for as long as İkmen would have liked. And besides, the Vloras had enough friends on the outside to ensure that Aryan could never be truly safe. The only consolation being that they would almost certainly be able to keep Mehmet Vlora off the streets for good. That was something that would please almost everyone.

For the moment, however, there were practicalities to be addressed. Tepe was in the process of moving Aryan Vlora and Engelushjia Berisha to a safe house where they would be guarded night and day until after Mehmet’s trial. After that, Aryan would be on his own. Hopefully, maybe together with Engelushjia Berisha, he would be able to disappear as totally as Aryan’s brother Dhori – if the youngest Vlora had indeed disappeared. It made İkmen wonder again where, if anywhere, the missing Dhori might be. He was the only Vlora brother apart from the one who died in infancy that İkmen hadn’t met.

There is an old saying about proximity to princes being dangerous. Basically a prince is a fire that burns brightly and with force, and anyone who gets too close is likely to get burned. Some friends and colleagues applied this to Ayşe Farsakoǧlu. Ever since the end of her affair with Mehmet Suleyman she had been edgy, something that Orhan Tepe seemed helpless to remedy. It wasn’t easy being in Tepe’s shoes because the edgier she got, the more tactless she became – her comment to Engelushjia Berisha being a comparatively mild case in point. ‘I hope that you and the old man,’ she said, tipping her head in the direction of Aryan Vlora, ‘aren’t committing immoral acts.’

‘No!’ the girl retorted with, Tepe was pleased to observe, some heat in her voice. ‘Aryan is a friend. He’s looking after me now, like a father.’

‘Sergeant Farsakoǧlu?’ Tepe said. ‘Could I speak to you for a moment please?’

As soon as they were out of sight of Engelushjia and Aryan who was packing the last of his meagre possessions into a box, Tepe gave vent to his anger.

‘What do you mean by asking Engelushjia questions like that about her friend?’

‘Her friend!’ she huffed contemptuously. ‘Why should a middle-aged man want to have a little kid like her around unless he’s fucking her?’

Tepe gripped her arm rather harder than she liked.

‘Ow! Orhan, you’re—’

‘If you’d seen what her father did to her, you’d let her live just about anywhere away from him! And besides, these people will be giving evidence against someone we know is a killer – Mehmet Vlora. So whatever they’re doing we need to keep them happy.’

‘Yes, but didn’t that sample from Egrem Berisha’s shirt match the blood on the Vloras’ floor?’

‘Yes, it did, but that doesn’t necessarily mean that Mehmet did it. Any good lawyer could argue that Aryan is lying to save his own neck. We must support him. Just keep focused on the job, Ayşe,’ he said, relinquishing his hold on her arm, ‘and stop taking out your own frustrations on others.’

Her eyes burned. ‘What do you mean?’ she said through gritted teeth.

‘I mean that you should make up your mind to forget about Mehmet Suleyman, he’s marrying Dr Halman now. Find yourself a husband before it’s too late!’

‘Oh, I thought I’d already done that!’ she responded, venomously looking him up and down.

‘I meant a husband of your own.’

Her face was a mask of pure fury. ‘So do I take it you no longer want me to do all those little things that Aysel won’t let you do to her?’

‘Sergeant Tepe?’

They both turned at once, caught as it were in the spotlight of the innocent gaze of the young girl before them.

‘We’re ready to go now,’ Engelushjia said.

‘Right.’

Aryan Vlora joined them. ‘I don’t suppose I’ll ever come here again,’ he said simply, ‘but then I’m not sorry for that. This has been a bad place – a place of death.’

Ayşe Farsakoǧlu wordlessly walked towards the front door of the apartment while Tepe helped Aryan and Engelushjia with their belongings.